


The Weight of Nothing (Us)

by Garotte8Goodnight



Series: Coming in from the cold [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: After the Fall, Gen, M/M, Slash in a certain light, Steve Rogers Feels, The Author Regrets Nothing, canon character death, i cried
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-04
Updated: 2016-03-04
Packaged: 2018-05-24 15:15:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 844
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6157804
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Garotte8Goodnight/pseuds/Garotte8Goodnight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What does it actually mean for someone to be gone? All of the dark corners and spaces they used to occupy, burning bright like a candle in the night just.. Empty. Cold.</p><p>For Steve, gone means a star in the sky winks out for the last time; a little light snuffed by the dark cruelty of the universe. </p><p>Gone isn't just a person departing this world;  gone is shattered hearts and empty homes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Weight of Nothing (Us)

**Author's Note:**

> There's a post going around the Internet at the moment on the theme of loosing relatives and what it means for someone to be gone. After reading it I had to write a Steve & Bucky fic version. It's such an emotive theme, what does it actually mean for someone to be missing from your life?
> 
> Each of the works in my 'Coming in from the Cold' series has been written in a different experimental style; as always, feedback is much appreciated. I'm a Mathematics & Stats grad student posing as a lit student. I need all the help I can get! 
> 
> I listened to "The weight of us" by Sanders Bohlke whilst writing, I'm guessing most Stucky fans are familiar with the song but if not, do go have a listen.

What does it mean to have a hole in the fabric of your reality? A gap in the universe in the shape of a man, one where you can see through to the darkness of the sky and the stars that twinkle like diamonds in the night.

What does it mean to have a space in your chest where something bigger than all of us just reached in and removed a part of you?

When you go to war you don't want to think about it, don't want to wonder about the 'what if's?'; especially if its not you going to war, especially if you're the one left behind. Deep down you know though, you think, I'll know how to deal with it if (when) the time comes.

When the worlds burning around you, you think it's okay, I planned for this.

Nothing can prepare you.

Oh sure, you can go through the daily motions of life; after the initial breakdown and despair, and the screaming - because someone just tore your literal heart out.

You can sit through meetings and debriefs and let people tell you that it was his choice, that there is dignity in loss and martyrdom. You think no, there isn't. There is nothing. Just nothing. Just an empty space at your side, and a hole in your world. You can remain composed throughout, look them all in the eye and nod like the perfect little soldier you are. The weight of the world just got a little heavier on your shoulders, now that you're the only one carrying its burden.

You can hold it together the entire day long until the darkness draws near, and you retire to your tent alone. Alone for the first time since you were seven years old, apart from those dreadful twelve months when you were the one left behind. When the boy with bright eyes and a brighter smile left you behind for the first time but not the last time.

Only this time you can't follow; there is no loophole here, no magical serum to change the shape of the universe.

\--

It's the silly things that tear you apart; the first night it's nothing special, just a dress uniform. Folded over the back of a chair, waiting for the man who left it there to come home. It's the most profoundly forlorn sight.

The poor thing, you think; it doesn't know how long it will be waiting, it doesn't know that when it was placed there after the mission brief that seems a lifetime ago it was being put down to never be picked up and worn again.

You look at it sat waiting in the place he always left it and think, it's just about the saddest thing you've ever seen; you're overcome with the urge to hold it close in your arms and stroke the soft wool with the love it deserves.

This, this is what 'gone' is. 'Gone' is not just the massive rip in your world and your heart that can never again be filled, gone is not just the emptiness of the space beside you, and the absence of someone's soft breaths when you sleep. 'Gone' is all of the little things; gone is the cot beside you with the blankets tossed back, waiting for someone to slide in. A discarded newspaper, a hat abandoned in the corner.

'Gone' is a pack of smokes left open on the desk, only half of them left, gone is the pair of gloves that you hold in you own hands now, droplets of salt water hitting the fabric. 'Gone' is a notebook filled with silly ideas, drawings and plans for "what we're gonna do after we win this war Stevie". 'Gone' is reading them all a hundred times over and feeling your soul break to pieces knowing that none of them will ever be fulfilled.

\--

When someone is gone we think it will be the big things we miss; we dream of days at Coney Island, slow dancing in the kitchen, fireworks watched from rooftops in the night on the Fourth of July. We think it's going to be the big and the bold, the memories that shaped the core of us.

But it's not.

It's the littlest things that filled all of the spaces in between; it's making pancakes in the kitchen on Sunday's, it's the smile and the quirk of an eyebrow at a daft joke, it's the pride and reverence when looking at a new sketch. Tongue between his teeth as careful fingers trace over rough paper, nodding his approval. It's rainy days in summer when its warm enough to run home in the rain without worrying about a weak chest, smiling, laughing, jumping in puddles.

It's the things that make the bones of him, the bones of us, made you strong enough to bear the weight of the world between you.

It's a dress uniform put down never to be picked up again while you wish you could hug the person inside of it one last time.


End file.
